Time to find a second Earth, WWF says

Oct 13, 2010

Beijing, seen here during a sandstorm in March. Carbon pollution and over-use of Earth's natural resources have become so critical that, on current trends, we will need a second planet to meet our needs by 2030, the WWF has said.

Carbon pollution and over-use of Earth's natural resources have become so critical that, on current trends, we will need a second planet to meet our needs by 2030, the WWF said on Wednesday.

In 2007, Earth's 6.8 billion humans were living 50 percent beyond the planet's threshold of sustainability, according to its report, issued ahead of a UN biodiversity conference.

"Even with modest UN projections for population growth, consumption and climate change, by 2030 humanity will need the capacity of two Earths to absorb CO2 waste and keep up with natural resource consumption," it warned.

If everyone used resources at the same rate per capita as the United States or the United Arab Emirates, four and a half planets would be needed, it said, highlighting the gap in "ecological footprint" between rich and poor.

The "Living Planet" report, the eighth in the series, is based on figures for 2007, the latest year for which figures are available.

A Jakarta slum resident washes clothes using polluted water. The WWF's "Living Planet" report has said that carbon pollution and over-use of Earth's natural resources have become so critical that, on current trends, we will need a second planet to meet our needs by 2030. The report says that 1 billion people do not have access to an adequate supply of fresh water.

It pointed to 71 countries that were running down their sources of freshwater at a worrying, unsustainable rate.

Nearly two-thirds of these countries experience "moderate to severe" water stress.

"This has profound implications for ecosystem health, food production and human wellbeing, and is likely to be exacerbated by climate change," WWF said.

Signatories to the UN's Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) are to meet in Nagoya, Japan, from October 18-29 to discuss ways of addressing Earth's dramatic loss of species.

The UN named 2010 as the International Year of Biodiversity. Under Target 7b of the Millennium Development Goals, UN members pledged to achieve by 2010 "a significant reduction" in the rate of wildlife loss.

Biologists say many species, especially mammals, birds and amphibians, are in headlong decline, their numbers ravaged by habitat loss, hunting or the likely impact of climate change.

An aerial photograph taken in July shows a riverway in Indonesian Borneo island. The rich biodiversity of Borneo is increasingly under threat from habitat destruction. A WWF report has said that in 2007, humans were living 50 percent beyond the planet's threshold of sustainability.

The WWF said biodiversity showed a dramatic loss overall, but one with sharp disparities.

Between 1970 and 2007, an index of biodiversity health showed a global fall of almost 30 percent, it said.

In the tropics, the decline was 60 percent, but in temperate regions, there was an increase of 30 percent.

Temperate zones -- the first parts of the world to industrialise -- may be starting from a lower baseline of species loss, which could explain the gradual improvement in recent decades.

Improvements in pollution control and waste management, better air and water quality, an increase in forest cover and greater conservation efforts may also be making headway in some temperate countries, the WWF said.

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Nice, but posting this is like bragging about inventing half a wheel. Where are the matching statistics for number of species lost? Species are being lost, you know, no matter whether other new species are being found at the same time.

I'm kind of confused on the comments on this thread. I guess I'm just really unbiased by this, but it seems to me that most of these people were affronted by the fact it said that

if everyone used resources at the same rate per capita as the United States or the United Arab Emirates, four and a half planets would be needed"

I agree. I also find it funny that "greenies" get made fun of, like being green is a bad thing? It's the equivalent of school children making fun of their intelligent classmates calling them nerds. American adults are nothing but older children.

I hope the scientists, governmental officials, and people interested in preserving this planet help us do so. This does not mean the end of the world, or some implication of a strange liberal agenda, this means the end of materialism and over-consumption. Doubt it'll happen though...

If this means that the leaders of the green movement are willing to increase political pressure and divert billions of dollars toward locating habitable planets and improving space launch capabilities, this is great news!

You know, I take back whatever.. The only solution to this malaise of hope concerning the overpopulation of people and their quest for economic prosperity is depopulation. The only way to acheive depopulation, I mean lets face it, people will procreate, and those natural selection processes, which the aetheist of the world swear by, is still alive and going. Therefore, the world will eventually be back on track to spawn kids at a rate close to what Mormons a generating now, because ala natural selection, after the Japanese/Korean/European races dwindle, those hell bent on procreation succeed. So get ready, because the only way to depopulate is famine and world war. I'm voting for a big fat military budget, a tight border with Mexico and everyone else, and a wide selection of GM crops out the ying-yang.

As a parasite that can communicate an idea, time for the animals who can't adjust, to go. It happens all the time. If global warming IS true, I look forward to taking a cruise to the North Pole to golf a few rounds!

Nice, but posting this is like bragging about inventing half a wheel. Where are the matching statistics for number of species lost? Species are being lost, you know, no matter whether other new species are being found at the same time.

Yeah, and BTW there's a pretty fundamental difference between *discovering* a new species and a new species coming into existance. Meanwhile, when a species is lost, it doesn't mean we misplaced it and should look under the couch.

The only solution to this malaise of hope concerning the overpopulation of people and their quest for economic prosperity is depopulation.

Back to the dark ages with you, Malthus.

Therefore, the world will eventually be back on track to spawn kids at a rate close to what Mormons a generating now, because ala natural selection, after the Japanese/Korean/European races dwindle, those hell bent on procreation succeed. So get ready, because the only way to depopulate is famine and world war. I'm voting for a big fat military budget, a tight border with Mexico and everyone else, and a wide selection of GM crops out the ying-yang.

Your views are so puerile that you should be publically pitied for your lack of awareness and empathy. Female education reduces reproduction rates. Female liberty allows for reduction of population to sustainable levels.

How many, compared to the number that are actually gone? Your statement, while literally true, only dodges the point -- that when species are gone, they're GONE. When we discover them, they were already there, just unknown. The number of actual species didn't actually go up. However you bob and weave and try to play with semantics, net species diversity is going down.

It will take them a while to realize that the game is up. The public now knows that the politicians paid the climatologists who put out the scary stories of CO2-induced global warming.

LOL! George dubya paying scientists to be on his side! And scientists going along with it! Meanwhile, all the replicans in the pockets of big business, and all the oil company executives are of TOTALLY PURE motives. Why, it would NEVER occur to ANY of them to play fast and loose with the facts.

Sarcasm aside, the fact that you are only willing to see the possibility of duplicity on one side of the argument (even in principle) says everything that needs to be said about the value of your 'objective' opinion.

"Scientists have discovered a new species of fish living almost 4 1/2 miles below the surface of the Pacific Ocean."http://news.blogs...surface/How many more species have not been discovered?

hat when species are gone, they're GONE.

How does anyone KNOW they are gone? How do you KNOW they have not evolved?BTW, I think the number of extinct species are orders of magnitude greater than not extinct. It is a good thing or dinosaurs would still be around and humans would not.

It's all about the New World Order and population reduction. The likes of Ted Turner, Rockefeller and Bill Gates talking about vaccines to kill the weak and reduce population. They want the population down to 500 million basically to serve there needs with a bunch of slaves under the one world government. Now the plan is to tax you for the air you breath and inoculate you with infertility vaccines and slow kill you with the body scanners in the airports that radiate you at unimaginable levels and will kill most of those giving the scans within 10 years.

"How does anyone KNOW they are gone? How do you KNOW they have not evolved?"

It's not hard to know that. You only need to catalog the genetic code of every known species, a project which is ongoing. If an apparently new species shows up, you can compare it's genetic code with the codes in the catalog. If it differs from all the known species, one can still determine its closest relatives. But rates of evolution are known, and new species do not appear suddenly. Generally it takes thousands of years for a new species to evolve.

The resentment directed against scientists surprises me, because I think of them as applying their knowledge to the betterment of our planet. Physical scientists are generally skeptical, only too happy to point out flaws in the findings of their peers and present their own contradictory results. Hence, when one finds the vast majority agree that human industries put our lives at risk, it seems the better part of wisdom to at least give them the benefit of the doubt.

The WWF's "Living Planet" report has said that carbon pollution and over-use of Earth's natural resources have become so critical that, on current trends, we will need a second planet to meet our needs by 2030.

I laughed so hard my face hurts.

Well, that's what you get when your environmental information comes from the World Wrestling Federation!

That is what happens when scientist loose their credibility and objectivity. Scientists are human after all.What surprises me is how childish and egotistical scientists are. "Harold Lewis, Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of California in Santa Barbara, has resigned from the APS after more than six decades. In a resignation letter sent to Curtis G. Callan Jr. of Princeton University, President of the American Physical Society, which has been released to the press, Lewis denounces the widespread corruption in the field, which he claims has become the norm."There are still a few with integrity. Too bad they have to wait until they are retired with their pension before they feel at liberty to speak out.

I hope the IPCC does not plan to quote from WWF again. By the way, while on errors of this magnitude, could it be 2300 rather than 2030? That certainly turned out to be the case for the glacier study report. WWF had botched that number from 2350 to 2035, and the IPCC quoted it without error-checking or source-checking.

At the current rate of consumption, it is likely we won't have much left in the way of fossil fuels, anyway.

Too bad they have to wait until they are retired with their pension before they feel at liberty to speak out.

You are right. Federal funds are used to control science.

In his farewell address (17 Jan 1961) President Eisenhower warned of the danger that a scientific-technological elite posed to our free society:

"The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present – and is gravely to be regarded. . . . public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite."

"It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our democratic system – ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society."

If only we could do that! What a wonderful experiment that would be, eh?!

Those who adhere to the numbers games that abound could go to the other planet and those who do not could remain here. (Or, we could do it the other way around as it really does not matter to the experiment who stays and who goes, so long as the two groups are kept separate and each groups has available similar resources for comparison).

Over a period of decades we could watch and tabulate any differences and/or changes observed.

Too bad we don't have the technology or knowledge of a match to this earth at present even if we did.

The discovery of "new species" in the past few years does more to show the impact that human beings have on other creatures and their habitat. Where there is access by fewer humans, it seems that there are more species still existing and, perhaps, introduced as well. Species that are under threat of extinction in other areas are abundant where we do not exist in large numbers.

If this is true, then about 75% or more of the humans on earth are going to die, and the earth will abide with a reduced, if wiser and sadder biological infestation.

Actually, it is guaranteed that 100% of humans will die, the questions are: 1) How quickly will they die, and b) at what rate will they be replaced? Or something to that effect. Again otto targets the heart of the matter and plunges into it with the pointy blade of his intellect. Like zorro for all Iberians. Also his rapier wit.

As Otto stated we are all going to die. As someone else said this report 2030 is probably a typo and they mean 2300 or something equally as different.

I agree the planet is overpopulated but that is what people do; they populate to the maximum the system can hold until births equals deaths. If we improve lifespan then population will increase. It is natural cause and effect.

If we want to alter this in any way - then we do it the only way i.e. match births with deaths. It does not have to be monitored by some police to operate as long as any variation is temporary.

To solve our problem what do we do? nothing! it will sort itself out weather we like it or not.

It seems obvious that improving lifespans will lead to population increase, but it is actually more likely that people who realize their life chances are better will have fewer children. Lifespans are high in Europe and yet their birthrates are relatively low. The better approach is to combine family planning with promotion of the world wide use of greener technologies.

Therefore, the world will eventually be back on track to spawn kids at a rate close to what Mormons a generating now, because ala natural selection, after the Japanese/Korean/European races dwindle, those hell bent on procreation succeed.

mosahlah , is speaking pure unadulterated Nazi bull.First it was just the "whites" , the chosen race. Then they added the Japs as honorary whites , now even the Koreans are honorary whites. Is there even such a thing as a "Korean" race ? The whites are guilty of the worst ecological damage and of "infesting" the most pristine land in this planet .

There are enough resources for Humanity to sustain its present standard of living for centuries.As for "depopulation" , the whole idea sounds like something right out of Mein Kampf . Decide who is the "inferior" races , then selectively kill or neuter the lower castes.

In the "third" world , wherever education levels are high , automatically people breed less no master how poor or rich they are. So instead of elitist ideas all we need is good level of nutrition and education.

While War causes the instant depopulation , it also causes the maximum damage ecologically. Just imagine what a nuclear confrontation will achieve.